Gone
by AirJordan8
Summary: He never, in a million years, thought he'd miss the island. Jack struggles to face the fact that his friends are gone. Implied Jate, Jack/Sayid friendship.


_This is my first Lost story, but I'm a total Lost addict so there will probably be more. It just came to me earlier and I had to get it down before I went to bed. Basically, imagine FlashForward Jack, drunk in his messy apartment. I apologize for any grammar errors. It's about 1:00am right now, and I think I'm getting a headache._

**...**

He never, in a thousand years, thought he'd miss the island. The island, where they had to run from monsters and polar bears, even from the mysterious and threatening Others. He never saw what Locke did. Locke, who said he could talk to the island, who only saw the miracles and the beauty. "I looked into the eye of the island," he had said "and what I saw was beautiful". Jack had inwardly rolled his eyes. He had rushed them all back. Back to what? Back to work, to the hospital or the box company or the chicken shack where they had come from. Back to sitting in LA traffic and driving through Burger King. Back to the evening news and waiting for your favorite show.

He thought it'd be different, this cruel, harsh world that they came from. And now, he didn't know why. They'd boarded a plane in a world filled with war, filled with honking cars and bustling sidewalks and bombs that could destroy entire counties. And they'd crashed into a world where money had no value, where it didn't matter where you'd lived before because you were now being put right next to everyone else. There were no slums, no Beverly Hills and no homeless. Their world was free from social classes, free from country lines and pollution. Their world was simple.

Yeah, in LA they had iPads and houses in the hills, but he would give those up any day. They couldn't replace what he really misses. He misses his little clinic, where people would come daily for treatment for their bumps and bruises. He misses that little "secret" beach where all the guys would take their girlfriends. He misses the waterfall where he'd once gotten a little too drunk with Sawyer and Sayid and the three had dared each other to jump in, the jumping spot getting higher with each sip of DHARMA beer. He misses the days where seeing Kate was as easy as walking down the beach. He misses the camp fires with Charlie, Hurley, Jin and Desmond, all of whom would get far too drunk and sing old DriveShaft songs until they were put to bed by the other survivors. Jack unscrews the cap from yet another bottle and takes a big gulp, wishing he still had people who would make sure he was in bed if he got too drunk.

He even misses The Others. He misses the problems they gave him, the threats, the orders, the mystery that surrounded them. He misses making plans against them, the army he's tried to start with Ana Lucia, the nights he spent with Sayid just drawing maps and discussing elaborate plans. He and Sayid, they'd had some good times. They weren't things that Jack (or probably Sayid) had considered to be good times while they were happening, but now that they were gone, he knew they had indeed been good times. Sayid had military knowledge and knew by a simple conversation who he could trust and who he couldn't. Jack had a medical degree and knew The Others from the time he'd spent at their camp. They'd made a great pair. It was that companionship that Jack misses the most. He takes a drink from the bottle in his hand as he thinks about how long it had been since he's felt that. The two men had discussed everything from if The Others were human or not, to how Jack was going to ask Kate to move in with him. They'd shared secrets, things neither of them would dare tell Locke or Sawyer, and they'd shared pasts, finding they both have things they wish they could undo. Sayid had gone to England shortly after the rescue, and then Jack had heard he was in Germany, then to France, or was it Italy? Jack can't even remember anymore, and that was years ago. They'd talked about nearly anything on that island. But now Sayid is gone and Jack misses his best friend.

Jack even misses his old enemy. Locke was almost as stubborn as Jack was. And the pair argued about anything they could find. The button, The Others, where they should live, even whether to stay on the island or not. Locke had loved that damn island. But rescue had come, and Locke had been forced back into what they had called "the real world" for so long. Jack almost feels guilty now, ripping Locke from what he had considered his home. They had argued about that too, Locke blaming him for taking away his entire world, just before they'd left. And if Jack knew it would be the last time he'd see Locke, he might not have fought with him after all. But he didn't know and they did fight. What did they say to each other? Jack can't remember, so he takes another drink. Maybe if he gets drunk enough he'll remember. Had he said anything hurtful? Probably. But all he could remember was that they had argued, yelling at each other like they had many times, and then it was over. Someone intervened or maybe they'd both just gotten tired of it, and Locke went one way, Jack went the other. He remembered feeling relief at seeing the man go. But Jack knows that now, if he could just argue with Locke one more time, if he could just listen to Locke tell him that everything happened for a reason one more time, he would. But Locke was gone too, probably off in Australia hacking his way through the jungle.

But most of all, more than anything, Jack misses Kate. Kate. Just the thought of her name makes him take another big gulp from the bottle in his hand. Kate, with her jungle green eyes and those chocolate brown curls that he loved to run his hair through. He wonders what she's doing right now. Is she safe? Is she comfortable? Or is she in a cheap motel room, just staying for the night because she can't stay in one town for more than a few days. She couldn't stay with him. She had left the minute they got to Fiji. She got her fake IDs and said her goodbyes, only two. One to him and one to Sawyer, before she got in that ugly yellow cab and drove out of his life forever. Five years, and he still dreamt of her. In his dreams, they are married, their children playing in the waves on their beach. But he has to wake up, he always does. And when he wakes, he has to face the cold reality that she is not lying beside him on his airline chair bed, covered in Oceanic Airlines blankets.

The logo mocks him. Oceanic Airlines. It fills his brain until it throbs, until he has to take another drink from his bottle. He remembered the day they'd arrived in Los Angeles, the images burned in Jack's brain. They'd all flown there in an Oceanic airplane, he'd almost laughed at the irony. His mother had been there, hugging him and crying, as had his friends' families. He'd met parents and brothers and sisters, all nameless faces bouncing around his head. And then they'd all left, one by one. Sayid, Hurley, Claire and Charlie, Sawyer, Sun and Jin, Desmond they'd all left. Returned to their normal lives. But they were all close still, and couldn't just leave each other. They'd all promised to stay in touch. But next thing you know, Claire's in Australia, Sun and Jin in Korea and Charlie's on tour. Locke and Sawyer have dropped off the map, Desmond and Sayid are off on their own adventures and Hurley's lost the energy it took to get everyone together. They'd had a one year reunion. Everyone but Locke, Sawyer and Kate had shown up. It had been nice to see them again, but it wasn't the same. They'd spent a year together, memorized each other's daily schedules and trusted each other with their lives. But now they were busy and, after a full year apart, it just wasn't the same. He'd gone anyways, secretly hoping that Kate would be there.

It was pointless, he knows. She's a fugitive now; he still has to remind himself sometimes. He'd spotted the Feds in the cars outside their little reunion and knew why she'd stayed away. But some, stupidly hopeful part of him still expected her to be there. How he wished he could intertwine his fingers in those silky curls now and tell her that everything would be okay. He'd tried so hard to make that true. He'd brought them all home, he'd accomplished his goal and he'd returned to disappointment. The "real world" wasn't as remarkable as his imagination had allowed him to envision it. Late at night back on the island, he'd look up at the sky and imagine he was looking at it from Los Angeles, and now, he looks up at the sky and wishes, prays that they could go back to that island. "You don't know what you got till it's gone," he can hear his father's words echoing in his head.

Jack takes another drink from the bottle.

**...**

_Tell me what you thought._


End file.
